#18 in TeenFic [prev titled "The Way We Almost Were"
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❝Don't,❞ he pleaded softly, offering her a tiny smile, ❝please don't make me a promise you will never be able to keep.❞ He released a quiet but deep breath, leaning forward even more, ti...
Bree bit down hard on her lip, absolutely showing her sensitive flesh no mercy as her teeth continued to gnaw at it with worry.
She should have gone to the station -- she had wanted to drive down there with Nick. But Maya had been a sobbing, shaken mess, and their mother had needed Bree's help in getting her to calm down while she tended to Maya's bleeding and cut lip.
Of course Bree was concerned about Maya, and she'd done everything she possibly could to console her and cheer her up -- but it was like her mind was running on two different but parallel lines. Concerned about Maya and terrified for Nick at the same time. Tending to one, while worrying about the other.
Eileen O'Connell, Dale's mother, had stopped by earlier -- which really confused and also angered the hell out of Bree, because wasn't she supposed to be Nick's guardian? Sure, he was no longer under eighteen, but if he was on probation, she was technically his guardian, wasn't she? That's why he had a curfew and couldn't stay at the dorms. It was why Nick always had to come back to Eileen's -- because she was supposed to be a guardian figure until his probation was over.
And she should've been there, at the precinct, with Nick! Instead, she'd turned up here to check on what had happened... The reminder only pissed Bree off more and she unintentionally yanked hard on the laces of her sneakers.
Once she was done slipping on her footwear, Bree grabbed the car keys and began running down the stairs from the living quarters of the building down to where the back door of the Quake was.
The minute Maya had fallen asleep, still in shock and uncharacteristically silent, Bree had told her mum she was going to check on Nick.
Who else was going to do it? Yes, he had Dale and Eileen. But... But Bree had seen the look on Nick's face when the police car had pulled up at the diner. She'd seen his expression when the sirens blared around them.
And she'd be damned if she wasn't going to go to him. He'd been afraid -- so, so afraid. Bree wanted to hold his hand, chase those fears away like she'd promised him once. And if not that, at least stand by him while he faced and dealt with them himself.
Bree wondered if any of them -- Dale or Eileen -- knew what Nick had done to get put on probation. She didn't think they did. So they wouldn't know how the trip down to the station would've effected Nick, they wouldn't know how he'd have been reliving a horrific memory. Nobody else would know because that was who Nick was. Reserved, a closed book, a fortress bound by lock and key -- and Bree was coming to realise he probably preferred it that way.
